Why Is It So Hard for Democracy to Deal With Inequality?

[untermensche]

Getting rich is easy.

Not in a modern capitalist system where ideas and innovation are not the property of the thinker or innovator most of the time.

Getting rich, as undefined a concept as that is, is a rare event in modern capitalism.

Like winning the lottery.

The system is set up to squash you and turn you into a cog. If you succeed a little bit the system is set up to steal from you and turn you into something that can be easily exploited.

Modern capitalism is all about exploitation for personal gain. Exploitation of labor and resources.

And if it destroys the environment the exploitation does not let up one bit.

 

[dismal]

Getting rich is easy.

Not in a modern capitalist system where ideas and innovation are not the property of the thinker or innovator most of the time.

You truncated the rest of my post. Where I explained exactly how to do it.

You don't need "ideas" or "innovation". You just need to hire some workers and exploit them.

I'd recommend hiring women. They'll do the same work for 80 cents on the dollar.

 

[RVonse]

Getting rich is easy.

First, you get some workers. This is easy because they have no choice but to come work for you for slave wages.

Second, you exploit those workers. Again, this is easy. Just wait until they produce something, take it, sell it.

Use your profits to get some more workers. Rinse and repeat.

I was actually following you until I read this

Just wait until they produce something

Are you kidding Dismal? Waiting for a bunch of skid row morons to actually produce something???

Ha! Now that was funny.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skid_Row,_Los_Angeles

 

[dismal]

Getting rich is easy.

First, you get some workers. This is easy because they have no choice but to come work for you for slave wages.

Second, you exploit those workers. Again, this is easy. Just wait until they produce something, take it, sell it.

Use your profits to get some more workers. Rinse and repeat.

I was actually following you until I read this

Just wait until they produce something

Are you kidding Dismal? Waiting for a bunch of skid row morons to actually produce something???

Ha! Now that was funny.

Not sure I get your issue. You don't think workers produce things?

 

[RVonse]

Not sure I get your issue. You don't think workers produce things?

Nope. Not all the time anyway.

But the rest of your post has merit. Especially the parts about explotation of labor. Unfortunately you have mixed one statement of pure fantasy with an otherwise reasonable post.

You should consider becoming a politican Dismal.

 

[Elixir]

Ah yes, the good old brainwashing of the Protestant Work Ethic. Rich people just work more!

I will make much more money than a lot of my peers because I was born to a well-off family.

My undergraduate and graduate education was paid out of pocket, I have no debt.

I have a lot of friends that work much harder than me, that make and will always make much less money than me. Probably because they had to take the first shit job they were offered when we graduated, because they had 100,000s of dollars of debt bearing down on them. I was able to just go back home for a year and then to grad school to ride-out the recession, and when I was done with that, my starting salary leapfrogged their current salary even though they have been working for half a decade.


And these are just the rifts inherent between the upper-middle class and the lower-middle class. This doesn't even touch the differences between the truly elite and the rest of us. So yeah, sleep well.

I was mostly talking about ownership. The only for most people to get "rich" is to start a company. Create a disruptive product, grow it from nothing, grow its value, sell - you make big money. The problem is that when you create a new company you are responsible for marketing, engineering, sales, finance, distributions, and everything else. It's a 90 hour a week job. I'll settle working for someone else and only work 40 hours a week. Secondly, for many jobs, the more you work, the more you get paid. For most sales jobs, the more you sell, the more you get paid. People who spend the extra time networking at events at night will generally close more deals that the person having dinner with his family at 5 each night. Same thing with engineers. The ones who put in the extra effort will become more valuable and will get paid more on average.

But my larger point that you might have missed is that I don't care about other people's success. It appears that you had an easier path than me. Bit whoop. I really don't care. Elon Musk can have a 100 cars, doesn't bother me in the least. I want three. That's all. I'm happy for people who desire great success, then work for it, then get it. I was there when I was younger. But I don't need it anymore.

I think that we need to focus on helping people up, not taking people down. Taking away your golden path isn't going to help anyone.

Getting rich is easy.

First, you get some workers. This is easy because they have no choice but to come work for you for slave wages.

Second, you exploit those workers. Again, this is easy. Just wait until they produce something, take it, sell it.

Use your profits to get some more workers. Rinse and repeat.

Good post, except that you can't "Just wait until they produce something". If you pay them while you wait, you go broke. You have to direct them to produce something you can sell. If all they produce is biological excreta your endeavor is likely doomed. The ability to direct others to produce stuff is well rewarded, but if you can direct other people to direct workers to produce stuff, then you are "upper management" which is even more well rewarded. Still, it's not all that easy, until you've lathered, rinsed and repeated so many times that you are directing hordes of upper management personnel. At that point it is easy to stay rich and to get richer, but it only starts out easy if you are lucky enough to somehow, by no effort of your own, stumble into say $140,000,000.00...

 

[untermensche]

Getting rich is easy.

Not in a modern capitalist system where ideas and innovation are not the property of the thinker or innovator most of the time.

You truncated the rest of my post. Where I explained exactly how to do it.

You don't need "ideas" or "innovation". You just need to hire some workers and exploit them.

I'd recommend hiring women. They'll do the same work for 80 cents on the dollar.

First of all you need to be the total kind of scum that has no problem living as a parasite off the labor of others.

This eliminates many people right off the bat.

 

[coloradoatheist]

You truncated the rest of my post. Where I explained exactly how to do it.

You don't need "ideas" or "innovation". You just need to hire some workers and exploit them.

I'd recommend hiring women. They'll do the same work for 80 cents on the dollar.

First of all you need to be the total kind of scum that has no problem living as a parasite off the labor of others.

This eliminates many people right off the bat.

When people start they aren't thinking that. When Hewelett and Packard started making computers in their garage it wasn't so they could be parasites. The other people didn't have the same drive and know how as they did.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You truncated the rest of my post. Where I explained exactly how to do it.

You don't need "ideas" or "innovation". You just need to hire some workers and exploit them.

I'd recommend hiring women. They'll do the same work for 80 cents on the dollar.

First of all you need to be the total kind of scum that has no problem living as a parasite off the labor of others.

This eliminates many people right off the bat.

What he was doing is showing your idea of how capitalism works, not reality.

 

[untermensche]

You truncated the rest of my post. Where I explained exactly how to do it.

You don't need "ideas" or "innovation". You just need to hire some workers and exploit them.

I'd recommend hiring women. They'll do the same work for 80 cents on the dollar.

First of all you need to be the total kind of scum that has no problem living as a parasite off the labor of others.

This eliminates many people right off the bat.

When people start they aren't thinking that. When Hewelett and Packard started making computers in their garage it wasn't so they could be parasites. The other people didn't have the same drive and know how as they did.

These genius inventors are the rare rare exception.

Sometimes, not very often, they can be their own masters.

The normal case is that the inventor is exploited by some capitalist who couldn't do the inventing.

 

[untermensche]

You truncated the rest of my post. Where I explained exactly how to do it.

You don't need "ideas" or "innovation". You just need to hire some workers and exploit them.

I'd recommend hiring women. They'll do the same work for 80 cents on the dollar.

First of all you need to be the total kind of scum that has no problem living as a parasite off the labor of others.

This eliminates many people right off the bat.

What he was doing is showing your idea of how capitalism works, not reality.

What you are doing is living in a dream world with fairies and dragons.

But even Game of Thrones is closer to modern capitalism than your fantasy.

 

[Harry Bosch]

When people start they aren't thinking that. When Hewelett and Packard started making computers in their garage it wasn't so they could be parasites. The other people didn't have the same drive and know how as they did.

These genius inventors are the rare rare exception.

Sometimes, not very often, they can be their own masters.

The normal case is that the inventor is exploited by some capitalist who couldn't do the inventing.

The problem is that there are a large group of inventors who are just lousy at business. If you have a great idea, but lack sound business sense, you'll fail. You don't want to hear this, but running a business is very difficult.

 

[untermensche]

So-called "being good at business" usually means "is a complete self-centered asshole".

It is nothing that ever should be rewarded.

 

[LordKiran]

So-called "being good at business" usually means "is a complete self-centered asshole".

It is nothing that ever should be rewarded.

wat?

Why strive for anything if your efforts won't be rewarded accordingly? Ideally people's honest work should be rewarded justly.

 

[coloradoatheist]

So-called "being good at business" usually means "is a complete self-centered asshole".

It is nothing that ever should be rewarded.

No. It's understanding all the pieces to go together and the tradeoffs to get everything done. Knowing how to make a disk drive, doesn't mean someone knows how to market it.

 

[untermensche]

So-called "being good at business" usually means "is a complete self-centered asshole".

It is nothing that ever should be rewarded.

No. It's understanding all the pieces to go together and the tradeoffs to get everything done. Knowing how to make a disk drive, doesn't mean someone knows how to market it.

Anybody can understand that.

What it takes is extreme self-interest.

Pathological self-interest.

That's what makes the system work because it is a pathological system of top down control.

 

[coloradoatheist]

So-called "being good at business" usually means "is a complete self-centered asshole".

It is nothing that ever should be rewarded.

No. It's understanding all the pieces to go together and the tradeoffs to get everything done. Knowing how to make a disk drive, doesn't mean someone knows how to market it.

Anybody can understand that.

What it takes is extreme self-interest.

Pathological self-interest.

That's what makes the system work because it is a pathological system of top down control.

No, most people are good at few tasks, once it gets all of it it's harder. I think I've asked you to just go find 50 guys on the street and just go start a business. It should work just fine.

 

[untermensche]

Anybody can understand that.

What it takes is extreme self-interest.

Pathological self-interest.

That's what makes the system work because it is a pathological system of top down control.

No, most people are good at few tasks, once it gets all of it it's harder. I think I've asked you to just go find 50 guys on the street and just go start a business. It should work just fine.

Sociopaths are good at getting others to do things for them.

Capitalism is a system devised for sociopaths.

The natural inclination is not to exploit others. The natural inclination is to help others.

In modern capitalism it takes a pathological mind to exploit others to the point of individual wealth.

 

[AdamWho]

To the initial question

The best interest of the individual is misaligned with the best interest of the society.

I don't have to be a racist to want to move to the suburbs where the best schools are.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Anybody can understand that.

What it takes is extreme self-interest.

Pathological self-interest.

That's what makes the system work because it is a pathological system of top down control.

No, most people are good at few tasks, once it gets all of it it's harder. I think I've asked you to just go find 50 guys on the street and just go start a business. It should work just fine.

Sociopaths are good at getting others to do things for them.

Capitalism is a system devised for sociopaths.

The natural inclination is not to exploit others. The natural inclination is to help others.

In modern capitalism it takes a pathological mind to exploit others to the point of individual wealth.

Calling 99% of humans sociopaths doesn't help your cause. People trade to get the things we need because there are very few places where humans get everything they need or want in one place. They do that through trade and specialization.